{"id":65404,"date":"2023-06-09T06:05:13","date_gmt":"2023-06-09T11:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=65404"},"modified":"2023-06-09T06:05:13","modified_gmt":"2023-06-09T11:05:13","slug":"capturing-carbon-with-machines-is-a-failure-so-why-are-we-subsidizing-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=65404","title":{"rendered":"Capturing Carbon With Machines Is a Failure\u2014So Why Are We Subsidizing It?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Capturing Carbon With Machines Is a Failure\u2014So Why Are We Subsidizing It?<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
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Human activity\u2014mostly the burning of fossil fuels\u2014has raised Earth\u2019s atmospheric carbon content by 50 percent, from\u00a0280 parts per million (ppm)<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0420 ppm<\/a>. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, we\u2019ve\u00a0released approximately 950 billion metric tons<\/a>\u00a0of carbon into the air. Every year, humans emit\u00a0more than 40 billion metric tons<\/a>\u00a0of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere, as of 2021 measurements. Even if we stop burning fossil fuels now, the amount of CO2 already in the atmosphere will cause Earth\u2019s climate to continue warming for decades, triggering heat waves, droughts, rising sea levels, and extreme weather.<\/p>\n

Climate scientists warn that if we want to avert catastrophe,\u00a0a significant amount of excess atmospheric CO2 must be captured and sequestered<\/a>. The process is called carbon dioxide removal (CDR), and it has been\u00a0receiving more attention<\/a>\u00a0as nations, states, and industries strive to meet their climate goals. But how should we go about doing it?<\/p>\n

There are two broad strategies: biological and mechanical. Nature already absorbs and emits about\u00a0100 billion metric tons<\/a>\u00a0of carbon dioxide every year through the natural processes in the biosphere\u2014including plant growth\u2014an amount 2.5 times humanity\u2019s annual carbon output. So,\u00a0according to advocates for biological carbon removal<\/a>, our best bet is simply to help the planet do a little more of what it is already doing to absorb carbon. We could accomplish this through\u00a0reforestation<\/a>,\u00a0soil-building agricultural practices<\/a>, and encouraging\u00a0kelp growth<\/a>\u00a0in oceans.<\/p>\n

On the other hand,\u00a0advocates for mechanical carbon removal<\/a> point to technologies that successfully capture CO2 in the laboratory; if these machines were scaled up, those advocates tell us, we could create an enormous new industry with plenty of jobs while removing atmospheric carbon and reducing climate risk…<\/p>\n

\u2026click on the above link to read the rest\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Capturing Carbon With Machines Is a Failure\u2014So Why Are We Subsidizing It? Human activity\u2014mostly the burning of fossil fuels\u2014has raised Earth\u2019s atmospheric carbon content by 50 percent, from\u00a0280 parts per million (ppm)\u00a0to\u00a0420 ppm. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, we\u2019ve\u00a0released approximately 950 billion metric tons\u00a0of carbon into the air. Every year, humans emit\u00a0more than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[23203,113,1081],"class_list":["post-65404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-carbon-capture","tag-carbon-emissions","tag-richard-heinberg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65404","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=65404"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65404\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65405,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65404\/revisions\/65405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=65404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=65404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=65404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}